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Tel: +33 4 93 39 87 31 Tel: +31 20 627 3215 Tel: +852 2311 8081 [email protected] Fax: +31 20 626 1155 Fax: +852 2311 8023 [email protected] [email protected] INTERNATIONAL PRESS LONDON CANNES, FRANCE 192-198 Vauxhall Bridge Road DDA Public Relations Ltd London SW1V 1DX Hotel Majestic, Salon Royan 1 Phone: +44 207 932 9800 1st Floor, 10 La Croisette Fax: +44 207 932 4950 E-mail : [email protected] Tiffany Kizito M:+33 6 66 67 70 60 P: +33 (0) 4 97 06 85 15 E-mail : [email protected] www.ddapr.com www.fortissimofilms.com CREDITS: MAIN CAST: COPYRIGHT NOTICE: written and directed by Alex van Warmerdam Borgman Jan Bijvoet Graniet Film, Epidemic, DDF/Angel Films, NTR director of photography Tom Erisman NSC Marina Hadewych Minis production design Geert Paredis Richard Jeroen Perceval TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS: editor Job ter Burg NCE Stine Sara Hjort Ditlevsen Running Time 113 min music Vincent van Warmerdam Ilonka Eva van de Wijdeven Gauge DCP 2K, 24fps, Color costumes Stine Gudmundsen-Holmgreen Brenda Annet Malherbe Aspect Ratio cinemascope 1:2.35 make up Marike Willard-Hoogveld Pascal Tom Dewispelaere Sound Dolby Stereo 5.1 sound design Peter Warnier Ludwig Alex van Warmerdam Country of Production The Netherlands/Belgium/Denmark casting Annet Malherbe Year 2013 producer Marc van Warmerdam Genre Thriller coproducers Eurydice Gysel, Koen Mortier, Language Dutch Mogens Glad, Tine Mosegaard Originally Shot on Arri Alexa, prores, log C444 line producer Berry van Zwieten Borgman’s arrival in the tree-lined avenues of an exclusive residential area is the beginning of a series of unsettling events around the carefully constructed facade of a wealthy couple, their three children and the nanny. SYNOPSIS Three armed men, one of them a priest, are out hunting At another villa Borgman is faced with Richard, a young on. Marina is upset all evening. Feeling ill at ease she Marina’s world of plenty is beginning to crumble; her in the woods. The prey they are after is under their very television producer. When he, too, is about to close the wanders through the house. When she discovers that the reality and her emotions are at the mercy of the stranger feet: a man, unshaven and sordid, who sleeps in an door, Borgman claims that Richard’s wife Marina once wounded Borgman is hiding inside the house she allows in her house, while her husband Richard haunts her underground dug-out of his own making. Borgman has nursed him in the past. Although Marina, when also at the him to have a bath and - without letting her husband dreams at night in the shape of a cruel monster. just woken up when his attackers stick a spear into the door, denies knowing Borgman, Richard cannot control know – arranges a place for him to sleep in the summer ground that narrowly misses his face. He manages to get his jealousy and aggression, and ruthlessly lays into the house in the garden. When Stine comes across the Two emaciated dogs slink through the house, but away and warns his followers who are hiding in similar tramp. He then pushes his startled wife back into the stranger by chance Marina tells her to keep his presence Borgman dismisses them peremptorily: “You have come haunts. They disappear in various directions. house. Borgman remains lying on the lawn, unconscious. a secret. too soon,” he says. In the night, when Stine and the When Marina comes out of the house, intending to look parents are asleep, he tells the children a story about a Borgman walks through the green avenues of a wealthy after the wounded man, Borgman has vanished. The next day Richard tries to make up with his wife for his white child that floats above the clouds. neighbourhood. He rings the bell at a large villa and behaviour with an expensive diamond necklace. Isolde asks the housewife who opens the door if he might have The couple’s three children, Isolde (6), Leo (7) and insists that she has seen a magician but nobody listens to He gets rid of the gardener and summons his followers. a bath. She shuts the door in his face without hesitation. Rebeccan (9), come home from school with their nanny her. And Borgman doesn’t seem to want to leave. Stine. Richard goes to his work where there’s a crisis going The time has come! Director’S Statement In Borgman I wanted to show that evil comes in everyday form, embodied within ordinary, normal, polite men and women who perform their tasks with pride and pleasure, and with ruthless attention to detail. I wanted to show that evil is enacted not just on cold winter nights, but in the optimistic summer, beneath a warm and comforting sun. And I wanted to show that a man like Borgman, who continually remains elusive, can intoxicate a woman so fully with desire that she is rendered powerless. This film is darker than my other films because I wanted to go further. I wanted to descend into an unknown, dark part of my imagination and see what was to be found there. And I wanted to make a film very much open to interpretation, one that raises more questions than it answers. I think Borgman is a strong film - ask me again in 10 years and I will have forgotten how I ever came to write it - but in my experience there are always things which could be better. Nevertheless I am very curious about how it will be received. And in the meantime I am working on a new film, my ninth film. ALEX VAN WARMERDAM (DIRECTOR / WRITER) Polymath Alex van Warmerdam (add composer, painter was the first film made with Graniet Film, the company Director’S selected filmography: and designer to his list of skills) was born in the Dutch he set up with brother Marc van Warmerdam in 1993. city of Haarlem in 1952. He studied graphic design Success continued with his 1998 film LITTLE TONY 2010 The Last Days of Emma Blank and painting at Amsterdam’s Gerrit Rietveld Academy which was selected for Un Certain Regard at Cannes 2006 Waiter before he co-founded the Music Theatre company and won for Annet Malherbe the Prize for “Outstanding 2003 Grimm Hauser Orkater (1972) and The Mexican Hound Theatre Screen Performance” at the 1999 Filmfest Ludwigsberg/ 1998 Little Tony Company (1980) with his brother Marc. Between 1978 Stuttgart. The film was also nominated for European Film 1996 The Dress and 1984 he shot a short film and two TV films before Awards in the Best Actress and Best Script categories. 1992 The Northerners making his feature debut in 1986 with ABEL, which won GRIMM (2003) was selected for San Sebastian and 1986 Abel the Critics Award at the Venice Film Festival. In 1992 he Riga, while WAITER (2006) won both public and critical 1984 De Stedeling [The Townee] (short film) scriptwriter, director, title role made the feature THE NORTHERNERS, which picked up acclaim at international festivals including Toronto. Van 1982 Graniet [Granite] (TV) scriptwriter, actor, design three Felixes (for best film, music and art direction). THE Warmerdam’s THE LAST DAYS OF EMMA BLANK (2009) 1980 Zie de Mannen Vallen [Watch the men fall] (TV) co-scriptwriter, actor DRESS (1996), which sold to more than 25 territories, won Best European Film at Venice, the Best Screenplay 1979 Striptease (short film) co-scriptwriter, actor won both the FIPRESCI Award at Venice and the Dutch Award at the Netherlands Film Festival and Best Film at the 1978 Entree Brussels (short film)co-scriptwriter, actor Film Critics’ Award at the Netherlands Film Festival. This International Film Festival Albania, 2010. Marc van Warmerdam - ProdUCER JOB TER BUrg - Editor Tom ERISMAN - DOP Marc van Warmerdam works extensively both in cinema Born in 1972, Job ter Burg has edited some of the most BORGMAN marks the fourth collaboration between DoP and theatre. In 1973 he co-founded, with older brother important and influential Dutch films made over the past Tom Erisman and director Alex van Warmerdam, having Alex, The Mexican Hound music/theatre company and decade. These include Rudolf van den Burg’s TIRZA, for previously worked together on GRIMM, WAITER and then, in 1980, the Orkater music/theatre company which he won a Golden Calf for Best Editing, Martin THE LAST DAYS OF EMMA BLANK. Previously a gaffer, which he has led since 1988, and in which he both Koolhoven’s WINTER IN WARTIME and Paul Verhoeven’s Tom has been Director of Photography since 1988 on produces and performs. Each year he presents three to BLACK BOOK, both of which garnered Best Edit numerous features, commercials and TV dramas. Other five productions, some of which are the theatre works of Golden Calf nominations. Other works include Alex van key works include many films made with the late Theo Alex. In 1993 Marc and Alex founded the film production Warmerdam’s THE LAST DAYS OF EMMA BLANK, Peter van Gogh, including LOOS, 06, BLIND DATE and BABY company Graniet Film. Since 2011, Marc has been the Kuijpers’ GODFORSAKEN and Martin Koolhoven’s SUZY BLUE, and two films shot with Eddy Terstall (TRANSIT chairman of the Netherlands Film Producers Association. Q. His collaboration with Paul Verhoeven continued and WALHALLA). with the 2013 Digital Emma Award-winning THE ENTERTAINMENT EXPERIENCE and the partially crowd- sourced film TRICKED, which was selected for Tribeca 2013.